Bizwatch

Conflicts of Interests
Three years after diamond producers signed up to a scheme designed to end the trade in "conflict diamonds" that were helping to fund some of Africa's bloodiest wars, campaigners are turning up the heat on gold miners.

Last week, New York City-based Human Rights Watch released a report alleging that the lure of gold fueled massive atrocities over the past few years in the northeastern Ituri region of the Democratic Republic of Congo. The 159-page report, entitled The Curse of Gold, names Swiss gold refining company Metalor Technologies Group as one of...